‘United will get run ragged by the German boys’
The coolest take of mine this week.
Getting smashed by OGS 5-0 is embarrassing. But look, that’s the reality of United, they have a lot of good players that on their night, can be absolutely devastating.
… poor Nagelsmann. That’s a real spanking. Another one of my hipster fantasies running into problems.
So, onto Arsenal.
We host Dundalk. It’s a dreamy story of a team that’s climbed the ranks with a coach that was teaching kids to play football in America not so long ago. What a day out they’re going to have.
We should beat them, but they’ll be high on life, so this will very much take on the vibe of an early-round FA Cup game. I’m praying for a win out here…
There’s a lot of misery around Arsenal and Arteta at the moment. Everyone needs to take a reality pill and get back on track with what the project is about.
This time last year, people were genuinely talking about Arsenal getting relegated. We were 12 points off 1st, and 4 points off 14th. There was no direction, the players looked uninterested, and things were about to get very, very bad for us.
We hired in a 38-year-old manager. He expertly steered us out of a hideous situation and stabilised the club. That was a huge task most thought he was incapable of.
His biggest mission has been to change the culture of the club, that takes time, especially when you can’t turn over large chunks of the squad that were badly recruited.
Arteta tasked himself with making us difficult the beat. He has achieved that. No one comes to Arsenal to roll us these days, you might think that’s no big deal, but we have literally been getting rolled by top teams for 10 years. We are good at defending. We have the second-best defence in the league and we rarely concede more than one goal. Shots against us have drastically reduced. Again, you might think that’s par the course, but it is within living memory that Watford had 32 attempts at our goal.
Part one of the job is on track. The foundation has been set. The next phase is about fixing the attack.
Here, we have to be realistic. Solving that problem with internal solutions, to the level we require, is unlikely to happen. We don’t have the attacking riches United, Liverpool, Spurs, Chelsea or City have… even Everton look like they have better-attacking options than we do.
We clearly lack a #10 or a modern #8 player. It isn’t one player either, it’s two. We don’t have players that thrive in the half-spaces. There’s no Hleb, Santi, Wilshere or Rosicky to make the magic happen. We’re currently relying on Saka adapting to that role, and that will be a huge ask. He’s more suited as a wide player.
Wide player-wise, there’s simply no world in which Arteta sanctions £72m for Pepe. He’s not playing well because he’s not that good. We hope based on his price tag, the reality is, if his name was Billy Smith and he was a youth player, we’d not be interested. Reiss Nelson is now the answer, but let’s be honest, he was struggling the break into Hoffenheim after a blistering start and we spent the summer trying to move him on. We love Gabriel, but it’s still a stretch to think he’s going to be a teenage saviour this season.
Then you look at the striking options. Auba through the middle isn’t an option because he can’t hold the ball up in the way we’d like. Lacazette isn’t right, and Eddie seems a way off ready. Fans are pumping Balogun?! That’s not right.
If we’re realistic, solving our attack is going to be very, very tough.
At the moment, our approach is to squeeze out chances to make our powerplays. The hope is that out of 4-5 good chances we create, we score one and batten down the hatches. This season, our form has been poor and we’re not taking our chances. Nothing has clicked and lady luck has covid.
You also have to accept that when you hire a young coach, they will make mistakes and misjudge situations. Arteta has a high ceiling, but he has to learn. We couldn’t afford to spend £15m on Poch, so we took a chance on potential. He will fumble, he will do odd things, but that’s a price worth paying, because when he gets it right, and he will, it’ll be worth the entrance fee.
‘SACK HIM’ is not analysis. It’s what stupid people who live in the moment say. Again, worth noting that the ‘best young coach in the world’, just had his arse handed to him by OGS. RB Leipzig is a very well assembled side deep into its development. They made the semi-finals of the Champions League last season. They are a good team, but bumps in the road are part of the journey when you bring in a young manager. Even Jose, with a far better squad than ours, tanked a 3-0 lead to West Ham.
I also find the perversion people have over William Saliba very, very odd. Arsenal are pretty good at defending. If we are not including a young player in our squad this season, there’s a good reason for it. The player had fitness issues last season, so we know there are problems there, because the Premier League is brutal. He can’t speak English, which is also tough to manage. He’s 19 years old, has just moved to a new country, and he’s dealing with horrendous personal problems. Do we think throwing a precocious talent into the first team, just because Dave on the internet saw two minutes of him on Youtube, is a good idea? Do we need to wreck him in front of millions to prove a point? 19-year-old centre backs at the highest level of the Premier League are a very, very, very rarely a thing. Arteta is protecting a player that has a very, very, very long career ahead of him. You are really struggling if your analysis of our problems right now is #FreeSaliba… but again, when things are not going well, any average idea is given oxygen.
Arteta will experiment. He is humble enough to admit when he’s wrong. He will develop his ideas. But you need to brace for the fact that the path to top 4 is not paved in goals, it’s brick walls and ruthless discipline… and the hope that January might bring a present or two.
Don’t lose faith. Don’t covet busted flushes that started with better tools. Keep the faith. This is the way. xx
Kung fu Eric
Stroller
“AMN played in midfield yesterday and was distinctly average there against weak opposition.”
I think you’ll find he played as our left wing back and he had a more than decent game..
I’m talking about playing him in a 4-3-3 occupying the position that Ceballos struggled with v Leicester .
AMN is way more athletic and skilful and pacey than Ceballos ..
Vardy’s speed and finishing is still world class.Leicester has built a system to facilitate his strength.
@Pierre –
I suspect it was a betting scam.
LFC
“If you simply want to improve the shots tally,it’s simple.
Remove lacazette, get likes of Saka, Tierney, Bellerin,Pepe etc to put in cross after cross for Auba and Nketiah to attack.
Variety of crosses.”
David Moyes football …wouldn’t work with Aubameyang and Lacazette up top , neither are particularly good in the air against 6ft plus defenders.
Jim
Agree
Pierre Against Leicester,I felt it was David Luiz who progressed the ball. We played through him. Whenever xhaka got the ball,he saw 2 options: 1) Tierney further forward but he could only swing a hopeful cross to the central area. 2) lacazette btl, surrounded by Leicester players. Since neither player had any support,he generally went back to Gabriel. As for Partey, he was in a bad, useless position. He was redundant. He should have been in Ceballos’s role. 3 midfielders behind the ball was too much. 2 midfielders with 1 pushed up BTL is what we needed. I have said… Read more »
AMN more skillful than Ceballos. I’ve heard it all.
Pierre
I agree finishing is a skill.
That was a mistake on my part.
I wanted to convey that Walcott was quite limited as a player but still scored a lot due to have intelligent movement.
Leftfootcurler
Are you available to take over this weekend?
Partey has been with us for two games only. It is obvious that the coaching team hasn’t set up a game plan for him yet. This midfield needs to be rebuilt. Let’s see what Arteta can come up with.
Pierre
Yes David Moyes football wouldn’t work.
I said that in the comment from which you quoted me.
My point is we have a style and it needs certain players.
Bett to continue to develop that style and buy relevant players to improve.
But david Moyes football would improve shots tally immediately.
Doesn’t have to be crosses on the head.
Low crosses.
Crosses from half space.
We won’t be 17th in shots like everyone is complaining about.
Graham
I am always ready 🙂
Raulishuss, Xhaka has been tasked by our different managers to restart the play because he is the best passer. However when the team is under pressure he disappears. Look at all the game when we were under pressing and suddenly you see his stats for touch of the ball drop. Last season there was a few games where both Guendouzi and Willock showed him up. Against Aston Villa, against Spurs he was transparent. Against Watford, he was the one hiding. Remember when he said that we were scared, the reality was that he was scared and hiding. I have said… Read more »
OGS plays more like Mou than Klopp and Pep. Both MC and the Pools press high. Manure doesn’t do much high press. Xhaka should have more space and time to do his passing.
Walcott lacked the technique and the intelligence required to become a world class winger.
He had blistering pace and his finishing was guite good.
As he grew older he should have been able to improve this technique and intelligence, unfortunately he never did and at 27 was still very similar to his 18 year old self.
Valentin
The point is xhaka gets on the ball more than Willock.
Since you are having Willock in your xi, his teammates will have 1 player less to pass to,in the middle of the park, making it easier for United to press you, and I am sure you are aware of their ability to hurt us via quick breaks when they win the ball.
Too risky to have Willock as 2nd CM,imo.
Pepe is a wide forward and needs to played closer to the goal.
Arteta deploys Pepe as a an out and out winger to accomodate Auba is the inside forward. Pepe is not much suitable to this role and therefore is ineffective for most of the game as he is shunted out to the right wing. Arteta imo should try to learn a little from the Klopp system where both the wingers cut inside and play very close to the goal while the full backs and sometimes central Midfielders provide the width.
Willock is not suited to play as central midfielder in a 2 man pivot as he always tend to push further up the pitch a la Ramsey.
His best role would be as a free/advanced 8 in a 4-3-3.
“Partey has been with us for two games only. It is obvious that the coaching team hasn’t set up a game plan for him yet. ”
We were reported to be chasing him for the whole of the summer and we didn’t have an idea of how we wanted to use him?
Andy
Vardy will be forever hungry, no doubt about that.
Do you think he would have been a success at the Emirates ?
“His best role would be as a free/advanced 8 in a 4-3-3.”
Fully agree.
Anyone including Xhaka in his preferred starting 11 must be trolling. It’s not a coincidence that we finished 2nd the season before he joined, and 4 full seasons later we haven’t been able to finish in top 4. We haven’t had a functioning midfield for about the same period and for a while we’ve reached the extreme lengths to just not play through the midfield at all. Now that we have Partey, if we want to progress, we need to limit Xhaka’s starts. I’m frustrated that people don’t see how he will always be a liability in our team and… Read more »
Marc. There is no need to argue. The fact is Partey was bypassed most of the time against Leicester.
Leftcurler
What’s a BTL? Seen you write that word a few times now. Is it a B2B?
Nelson
Partey in the exact role that Ceballos played vs Leicester would be superb.
If there was a plan to play Partey, Raul probably took it away.
Gons
BTL means between the lines.
We lack players who used to play between the opposition’s midfield line and defence line.
We removed the ones we had – Ozil, Ramsey,iwobi,mkhi
And didn’t replace them.
B2b just refers to a box to box midfielder.
raptora
Agree on Xhaka – what those who rate him can never answer “Go through the table and tell me how many other PL teams he’d start for every week?”
Leftcurler
Oh cheers. Yes we definitely don’t have runners running between the lines. But it’s more to do with the rigid system that we play. Even emery had more runner from his pull back to the center tactic.
But if arteta allows more attacking freedom, we will see runs from el neny and partey, xhaka not so much.
Hi Karim. Yes, I think Vardy would have been a success at the Ems. Just how much depends on how Wenger would have used him. I don’t believe that he wanted to change our style of play to suit Vardy’s game so my guess is that he would have been a ‘Plan B’ option with Giroud still first choice. I doubt that he would have played the two together although that may have been a decent option. So he would have been more of a bit part player, still successful no doubt but not as successful as he has been… Read more »
It seemed that we bought Partey to be stranded in midfield same way we gave Auba mega deal to be marooned in midfield.
From his 15 mins cameo, I would say Balogun has more sauce than Nketiah ..the gun in his name is enough for me to give him ago!
** It seemed that we bought Partey to be stranded in midfield same way we gave Auba mega deal to be marooned on the wing
Andy
Hard to disagree with this. He would have been such a non-typical Wenger signing though, just like Suarez by the way.
Could have been good fun. Oh well…
Vardy would not have excelled under Wenger at that time.
Tierney
“Willock is not suited to play as central midfielder in a 2 man pivot as he always tend to push further up the pitch a la Ramsey.”
He played that role alongside Guendouzi at home to Burnley and it worked really well with ceballos ahead of them .
Sadly , those 3 never played another game together.
100% Wenger has Vardy playing right midfield.
Leftfoot continues to offer views that go beyond ‘this player is shit’, refreshing to see someone actually take more than one aspect into consideration when chewing over matters.
Also doesn’t appear to be any conspiracies or bias in his views of players, takes them all at face value and appreciates both what they can/can’t offer and the implications of that.
Much more enjoyable content because of it.
Arteta has Vardy on the wing too so Nketiah can run around and appear busy, or Laca can drop deep because he’s “frustrated”.
We just have to hope this is Vardy’s last season. He always scores against us. I can’t watch his gyppo rat fuck face any more.
Karim
Laurent Robert was my post-90’s man crush for a spell, glorious left foot on him and Newcastle were a quality side then.
Me neither, I still am jarred by that annoying inevitability once Vardy came on the field on Sunday.
Fixture list hasn’t been kind to us but we have to start collecting points against these sides in and around us.
I wonder how many points we would have saved over the past few seasons if we have bought Vardy and Oziled/deregistered him? He was already, what 28 or 29 when we went in. Incredible winter of his career, that guy.
@Leftside, it looks as though the lack of pre season and the empty stadiums is favouring the more attacking side, or maybe the counter-attacking side. We need to start showing more knicker than skirt or I fear we will keep getting rolled.
Oh my god. Vardy is a bustling forward who does score a few. He’s the pub footballer who is a plasterer by trade and has a bird called Lynne.
Domestic level. Relax.
G8 “From his 15 mins cameo, I would say Balogun has more sauce than Nketiah ..the gun in his name is enough for me to give him ago!” I would say they are both a slightly different type of player. Seeing Balogun last night and even though he didn’t do a lot, what I did see was a player who looked explosive in his movement, unlike Nketiah. I could imagine him being a proper handfull for defenders , we must do all we can to keep him. Eddie is more an Andy Cole type striker who pops up in the… Read more »
Vardy or Laca 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
Dominik Szoboszlai reminds me of Yoann Gourcuff.
Left foot curler, This is a bit late. Still catching up to the comments haha. I rate your posts highly as I like the tactical thoughts behind them. This just doesn’t make sense considering most of them are attacking midfielders… “The problem is in attack,not midfield. We removed Ozil, Ramsey, iwobi, mkhi who all play in those pockets of space and didn’t replace them. It’s why I have been saying we need to buy Sancho/grealish/Maddison/Coutinho/Brandt/buendia.” Our problem in my opinion is definitely midfield. Xhaka is so slow on the ball, and Ceballos isn’t an AM. We have major problems utilising… Read more »
Nice to see good posts from Valentin and Keftfootcurler., Both are relevant posts really ,so no need to compete. The crux appears that Xhaka is our problem. Has good ,but useless statistics, easily dispossessed and prone to fouling under pressure for which Arteta moved him up to prevent costly fouls. Clearly Arteta favourite, the team knows and makes a lot more passes to him than a better player Partey. Xaka promptly mostly passes back. So ultimately it appears Arteta obtusiveness is our problem , consistently playing class players out of position. This actually illustrates Arteta deficiency not to device a… Read more »
The focus has shifted to Pepe (as it should). He made the difference last night.
Arteta talks about more ‘consistency’ from him. But what he really wants are more game-changing ‘moments’ from him – and that will not happen until Pepe is played consistently.
englandsbest
If it was up to me, I’d have Pepe playing every game.
He can do special things.
I guarantee if he had had a consistent run in the team, we would have seen far more of these special things.
Goobergoner
” What ishola says is not wrong.”
I know my fucking onions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-HjoGng4jA
The notion that we need a creative midfielder to start creating is in my opinion incorrect. If you watch teams like leeds , atlanta and other in the champions league, you can easily observe that they move the ball in patterns that end up in a big chance/goal. Point is Arteta can create patterns of movement with these players and solve the creativity problem BUT unfortunately it seems he does not have that much ideas because every time i watch arsenal play this season it looks there is no plan B also at this point the opponents know that arsenal… Read more »
CC
I saw them destroy my local team 4-0 in the uefa cup at the time with a screamer from Robert.
Ameobi was a player I liked a lot back then.
Watching the full replay. Dundalk are quite meh and nice boys who do not foul. Arteta put in substitutes first time so extensively. One can expect the youngsters to have deficiencies , but playing them a few times will enable them to get a feel of real life competition. Also applicable to Pepe who first time ,after having a hostile Bellerin has youngsters who return passes . Out of practice after Bellerin I guess since Pepe was initially not getting into positions to accept return passes.
I agree with S Asoa.
I think the senior players don’t pass Pepe enough on purpose. Similar to the episode Benzema had this week, they don’t seem to trust him so he at times looks completely isolated. Yes, he might be frustrating at times, but he doesn’t deserve the treatment of receiving 10x less balls than the other winger.
CC
Thank you,your comments are much appreciated.
My gripe with Pepe is that he should bulk up a little, but that should also be obvious to Arsenal staff and they should make him that much stronger. A little strength wouldnt hurt his pace or skills.
Graham62
Me, too, tho’ not always as a starter.
I’d play Elneny alongside as an accomplice, to mop up when Pepe loses the ball. And I’d curb Bellerin’s forays upfield to allow Pepe space and scope.
A few games like that, and Pepe’s ‘moments’ will multiply. Time for Arteta to be a little less cautious, certainly in the second half. Starting at OT on Sunday.
Bringing with Ceballos and Williams in a match we are quite comfortable at 3-0 and fortunately Dundolf not having any apparent goal scorer is absolutely timid on part of Arteta. That guy is pathetic. Should have brought in some fringe keeping the back strong.
Always impresses me seeing the manner certain players get defended, or abused by fans. Pepe is apparently a victim of Arteta and his teammates now. Arteta for not playing him enough, his teammates for not passing to him enough. Then there’s others who are having it all worked just for them allegedly. So are we ignoring the fact that if Pepe did the basics every game he’d have more trust from his manager to start games, and if he made more good decisions on the pitch he’d be given the ball by his teammates more and more (hello Saka)? Odd… Read more »
Karim
I liked that Toon team, always had a handful of guys I’d enviously enjoy watching. Solano was a cute player, Robert, Asprilla was electric. Ameobi was such a force, and then dog shit another week haha frustrating guy. Big Al was a force always though.
Even later on they seemed to have a few players worth a watch like Tiote, Ben Arfa, Cabaye, Jonas, Martins, Bellamy.
Ballogan didn’t anticipate a back heel. This is a reason why youngsters should be given game time when possible to get a feel and get confidence. An immature coach will discount an youngster on his first appearance when he is trying to get his bearings like Arteta did with our St. Etienne defender
Goobergooner I am glad you enjoy my writing. Well the term “attacking midfielder” is a bit of an oxymoron. Here is how I use certain terms:- Players who do most of their work in the final third are attackers. Players who do most of their work in 1st and 2nd phase are midfielders. Attackers love to roam, looking for opportunity to score. It’s a fundamental midfield trait to be disciplined and to be able to block space. Ozil,iwobi,mkhi without question did most of their work in the final third. So I consider them attackers. Before talking about Ramsey, I will… Read more »
Sometimes one needs political acumen or maturity to read into mind games and not blindly believe some PR put out as gospel truth
“An immature coach will discount an youngster on his first appearance when he is trying to get his bearings like Arteta did with our St. Etienne defender“
Seems a bit of a foolish claim. So Arteta, a young coach at the pinnacle of the football elite, is brazenly going to overlook something you’re keenly aware of from your living room chair?
Idk about that one.
Keftfootcurler
Your initial preamble was on principles of play.. Sound fundamentals, maybe a reason why your conclusions are also spot on.
👍🏽
To be fair I wondered recently about Arteta’s reasoning for leaving out Saliba of the Europa League squad list and it was because he had so many CB’s but then he registered Balogan who has 3 other players ahead of him. Kinda makes no sense but Mikel admitted he fucked up recently which was nice. Better to admit fault than dig your heels in
Arteta on whether Aubameyang could play centrally:
‘It’s one of the options that we have for sure in the team, to evolve it. The moment he doesn’t score in three or four games, people will say, ‘He needs to play more central’. It was great for him to play on the left because he wasn’t picked up by central defenders. There was more freedom for him to do that. [Criticism] is a part of this industry.’
He still doesn’t get it
As most people noticed in the situations of Guen, Torreira, Martinez, Saliba, Pepe, Martinelli, Auba the manager doesn’t know best. All these players were/are suffering under Arteta. Yet Xhaka, Mustafi, Kolasinac, AMN are still here going strong game after game. Imagine being a yes man no matter what is happening with the logic “If the manager decides it, it’s obviously the best thing, so don’t comment on it”. Reminds me of Wenger saying he does not have to explain his substituions cause he’s been a manager for 30 years and has made 50 000 substitutions. It was after the game… Read more »
There are 5 GKs registered. So guess Saliba could not be accomodated. Curioser
Raptora
You are wrong. Think Wenger boasted about making 20000 substitutions. And STUFFU conclusion us correct
😂😂
Also people pining for the return of Martinelli and hoping that he’ll inject something special into our attack have to remember not only is he coming back from a long term injury but prior to the injury Mikel barely played him. So expect training wheels for him for a couple of months or I wouldn’t even be surprised if he was loaned out by Mikel.
Honestly CC is reaching Bamford level of annoyingness.
Whatever anyone says about Arteta and he’s there to say:
“So Arteta, a young coach at the pinnacle of the football elite, is brazenly going to overlook something you’re keenly aware of from your living room chair?”
Why have a blog with comments then? Just stop the comment section. Only UEFA Pro Licence coaches should be allowed to write. Sorry Pedro but you can’t have an opinion either.
Not registering Saliba was not THE mistake. It was a consequence of a mistake.
If I remember correctly, we wanted Saliba to go on loan to the Championship, which could have happened until the 16th, and that’s why we didn’t register him. But then we screwed up getting him on loan or Arteta changed his mind, and by then I think it was too late to register him for Europa (which had to be done by the 8th).
Incompetence in any case.
CC,
“So Arteta, a young coach at the pinnacle of the football elite, is brazenly going to overlook something you’re keenly aware of from your living room chair?”
Then why do you keep suggesting Nelson should be selected ahead of Pepe? Do you think Arteta is brazenly overlooking Nelson or is it that he just notices he doesn’t produce much despite “doing all basics better” than Pepe?
Raptora
You find irritation in someone questioning your views, then either it’s an appeal to consensus or straw man bullshit so spare me the criticisms.
You’re free to write what you like, but it also invites response. Either debate it or ignore it. Nobody is censoring your speech.
Kris either way it looked dumb when you consider the players Mikel chose ahead of Saliba and not just that but in Mustafi, Chambers and Mari he registered 3 players who were injured at the time ahead of Saliba. So not only was it a fuck up because Saliba should have been given games and experience in that competition or because Saliba is better than some of the players picked ahead of him but 3 of them were injured and then subsequently Holding and Luiz got injured. Big mistake by Arteta
Kris
The two instances aren’t remotely similar.
Kris, It boils down to two mistakes. First Arsenal had agreed a deal with ASSE for Saliba to go back there. Then Rennes cames in and throw a spanner because they were offering Champion’s League football to him. Unfortunately somebody realised late than sending him to a team qualified for Europe meant that Saliba could not qualify as home grown so it was all stop. That was the first mistake not realising earlier the consequence of sending him on loan to a French club playing in European competition. The second mistake boils down to Arteta changing his mind late. Instead… Read more »
Raptora, Do what I do. Deliberatedly ignore all comments by that poster. I do not engage at all and let him get into fight with others. I found that Bamford annoying and slightly deranged, but at least he was polite and did not insult others unless insulted first. I also found that whatever he was writing, there was a posse of people who got triggered. Which was funny, because most of them agreed with his opinion that Arsenal had a poor squad. They just can not countenance the fact that he considered OGS a better coach than Arteta and that… Read more »
Raptora/Val
So sorry guys, give me the hymn sheet and I’ll get singing so not to displease you. And I won’t point out your lies in pursuit of a narrative again Val, pinky swear.
One has humour the other one did not
he was a Google stats type.
Looks like Arsenal is sharpening is its hatchet again, Huss Fahmy the Arsenal top contract negotiator is leaving soon.
Guess it make sense if Edu is reshaping the negotiation team following Raul departure.
Looks like none of the oldies will not be anybody left. I know that Huss Fahmy only joined us in June 2017, but it starts to really look like Edu wants to make tabula Rasa.
Valentin
Well let’s hope Edu is as good as he thinks he is. The Saliba debacle hasn’t got people talking about our world class operation.
My sources tell me Huss Fahmy was responsible for trying to offer Mustafi a new deal. Kroenke found out and sacked him.
@Valentine “I kind of understand the mistakes, but to me that still show a lack of medium term planning behind the scene. Somebody should have sit with ARTETA and draft a plan for every players.” Totally agree but it shows a lack of planning for the decisions being made by Arteta. He knew that if it happens so that Saliba will not be registered than how will I deal with this new situation and if there is no satisfying answer than escalate this situation’s priority. Without digging up any Ozil arguments, but this also applies to this situation. If by… Read more »
Marc, I hope as well. I know that in France Arsenal negotiation team was reported to be a joke. I thought that Raul constant interference was the main reason, but it looks like Edu has decided the cause went deeper. The Saliba debacle is more due to our administrative team and Arteta changing his mind. Maybe like I alluded earlier, Arsenal needs to have a better structure and overall organisation, and a proper medium term plan. I know that in many French clubs, there is some kind of medium term plan for every players and positions. Maybe because it is… Read more »
MD, I hope that Edu has realised that there is a need for a joined up medium term approach and working on that. That medium term approach is more than just administrative organisation. Arteta seems to like hoarding players, which make sense for this condensed season. However if he is not going to use some players, then we need to aggressively work to either sell them or loan them. Everybody focussed on Özil, but Sokratis is in exactly the same situation. Every who could add up could see that two senior non-home grown players were going to miss out. How… Read more »
I have a feeling that Arteta is over worked. His assistants seem to be of little help. Anyone would have stop him to play Willian as false 9 and Auba as RW. The handling of Siliba was not well thought out. He blamed it on unexpected set back of Mari. But he is taking unnecessary risk in the first place. He couldn’t get Pepe going. I am hoping that he’ll at least get Partey play to his potential. and he’ll finalize his starting 11.
Left foot curler “If you get a chance to re-watch arsenal games,pause when the ball is with CMs.And look at their passing options.There isn’t much. Just 1 player btl surrounded by opponents.” This is one problem I have noted many times over the last seasons for sure. The forward line is mainly static (which is an attacking issue) and there is no-one really making themselves available in areas forward of the ball carrier. Hence the back passing. Totally agree with your assessment. Haha and yeah I understand where you’re coming from in regards to 3rd mids and what not. Would… Read more »
Don’t count those chickens yet
AMN should have done better there
He has the fresher legs
Why is AMN helping him up?